Casinos and other forms of gaming comprise a growing multi-billion dollar industry both domestically and abroad, with electronic and microprocessor based gaming machines being more popular than ever. A brick and mortar gaming entity that provides gaming services, via stand-alone casino-type machines, may control gaming devices that are globally distributed in many different types of establishments. For example, gaming machines that are stand-alone units, may be placed in casinos, convenience stores, racetracks, supermarkets, bars and boats.
Brick and mortar gaming establishments typically use electronic and microprocessor based gaming machines can include various hardware and software components to provide a wide variety of game types and game playing capabilities, with such hardware and software components being generally well known in the art. For example, bill validators, coin acceptors, card readers, keypads, buttons, levers, touch screens, displays, coin hoppers, player tracking units and the like are examples of hardware that can be coupled to a gaming machine. Software components can include, for example, boot and initialization routines, various game play programs and subroutines, balance or credit, and payout routines, image and audio generation programs, security monitoring programs, authentication programs and a random number generator, among others. These software components are generally configured to provide these functions for a single gaming machine and each gaming machine typically duplicates the functionality of the other gaming machine in a brick and mortar casino.
In a typical, electronic and microprocessor based gaming machine operated by a brick and mortar casino, such as a slot machine, video poker machine, video keno machine or the like, a game play is initiated through a wager of money or credits that have been deposited directly into the gaming machine in some manner, whereupon the gaming machine determines a game outcome, presents the game outcome to the player and then potentially dispenses an award of some type, including a monetary award, depending upon the game outcome. In this instance, the gaming machine is operable to receive, store and dispense indicia of credit or cash as well as calculate a gaming outcome that could result in a large monetary award. The gaming machine is allowed to operate in this manner-because it is placed typically in location that is monitored (e.g., a casino), the gaming machine hardware and software components are secured within a locked cabinet and the gaming machine includes a security system for detecting fraud or theft attempts.
The functions available on a stand-alone, gaming machine may depend on whether the gaming machine is linked to other gaming devices. For instance, when connected to other remote gaming devices, a gaming machine may provide progressive jackpots, player tracking and loyalty points programs, cashless gaming, and bonusing among other items. Many of these added components, features and programs can involve the implementation of various back-end and/or networked systems, including more hardware and software elements, as is generally known. Nevertheless, the bulk of game play functionality on the gaming machine is provided via hardware and software located on the gaming machine.
Traditionally, as described in the previous paragraphs, casino-style gaming has been provided using self-contained devices, where each machine contains all of the hardware and software required provide a gaming experience, including generating game outcomes, providing a presentation of the game outcome and handling monetary transactions. More recently, client-server system architectures have been developed whereby one server can service the gaming requests, including game outcome generation, for multiple display devices. Although these client-server system architectures have applications in traditional brick and mortar gaming establishments, their major application so far has been in allowing the availability of casino-type gambling to expand via Internet based casinos.
In a client-server system architecture, the capabilities of the client and the tasks it is allowed to perform can vary depending on the location of the client. For instance, in a brick and mortar establishment, such as an Indian Casino, which are a secure location, slot-like gaming machines provide Class II games, such as bingo or lottery, where the gaming machines access a central server to obtain serialized, pre-determined outcomes. These clients are operable to provide money handling transactions and generate presentation of the game outcome received from the server. These clients are very similar to the gaming machines traditionally used in brick and mortar gaming establishments and are often capable of providing local game outcome generation as well as receiving game outcomes from a remote server in the client server system architecture. Further, in a casino environment, a private and dedicated network is usually used to connect the client and server devices.
As noted above, Internet-based gaming is another example of a client-server system architecture and is an area where casino-style gaming is now being provided. In Internet-based gaming, the player's home computer or a mobile device, such as phone, contains the client software that interacts with a centralized online casino server. Since the client device is located in a non-secure environment, such as a player's home, the client device is used to provide only an interface that allows the player to view the game presentation and provide inputs, such as wager amounts or game inputs, that allow a wager-based game to be played.
In the example described in the preceding paragraph, the individual gaming transactions, accounting, player tracking, game outcome generation are handled by one or more the Internet casino servers. Further, the Internet casino servers are configured to provide functions that are usually not that important for brick and mortar casinos, such as player registration, which involves allowing new players to play games online, player account management, which involves electronically tracking a balance of funds in a players' account including transfers of funds in and out of the account, player verification, which involves determining whether a player is eligible to play games based-upon such factors as their age, location or credit worthiness and client software services, which provides software needed by the client to interact with the online casino and/or generate a game outcome. The software that allows the individual game transactions, player registration, player account management, player verification, accounting, game outcome and client software services is usually provided as a single integrated package, often referred to as casino platform software.
As compared to a brick and mortar gaming establishment, a gaming entity providing remote gaming services, such as an Internet-based casino, may provide gaming services to tens of thousands of or even hundreds of thousands of users/clients while a single land-based casino may include only thousands of gaming machines, which primarily operate as stand-alone devices. Further, an Internet-based casino interacts with clients that have hardware, software and communication capabilities that are much more variable from client to client as compared to a brick and mortar establishment. In a brick and mortar establishment, the gaming machines are much more homogenous and communications issues between a server and client are more reliable. In addition, because the security of the client and its location can't be relied upon, Internet-based casinos provide a much higher level of functionality in regards to player monetary account management and additional functions not generally provided by the stand-alone gaming devices of brick and mortar establishments, such as player registration and player verification.
In general, the client functionality is much greater in brick and mortar casinos as compared to the client functionality in Internet gaming. As a result, the gaming architecture in a brick and mortar casino can be considered a mostly distributed computing architecture while in an Internet casino the computing architecture can be considered a more centralized computing architecture. The differences in scale, functionality and computing architecture between brick and mortar casinos and Internet casinos lead to casino platform software packages executed on casino servers in Internet based gaming that are generally larger, more complicated and integrated than the server-based software packages utilized in a brick and mortar gaming establishments.
Player's gaming interests are constantly changing and the effort associated with providing fresh content to users is quite costly. However, most online casinos offer games solely developed by the company that provides their casino platform software and are unable to provide games developed by other software providers. The ability of a casino operator to maximize their operating profits and keep their customers happy is directly linked to their ability to provide new and desirable gaming content. In view of the above, it would be desirable to provide gaming apparatus and method that reduce the costs associated with providing new gaming content, such as new games, on gaming devices, such as remote gaming clients served by an Internet-based casino server.